Hannibal Fhtagn
by Student of Dreams
Summary: In his house at R'lyeh dead C'thulhu waits dreaming... of Will. (Written for HannibalExchange)


**A/N:** This is something I wrote for the Hannibal Exchange over on Dreamwidth. The recipient wanted anything with Will, but suggested Lovecraftian!Will as potential AU and I couldn't resist. I originally wrote this under the title 'C'thulhu Fhtagn', but changed it here. So if you search for it anywhere else it's under the original title.  
Please Enjoy

**Hannibal Fhtagn**

I have always had nightmares; Painful visions that plagued me in twilight hours. Yet up until a few days ago dawn had always brought relief. The rising sun was able to cleanse the darkness from my mind.

There had been, on the eve of my terror, a great earthquake. Its terrible shaking disturbed the countries peace and, I believe, dislodged something from deep within the globe's unconscious and I have become witness to what has risen.

My name is Wilcox Graham. I am an artist, tucked away in the small confines of Wolf Trap, Virginia, and there nothing particularly special about whom I am nor where I live. There is no reason for me to believe that something out there has been speaking to me and, it seems, _only_ me.

Years ago I had retreated from the world to the confines of my farm. It was not a decision made for any other purpose than I enjoy solitude and the company of canine companionship over that of a human's.

My general air has always made others uncomfortable, but they often tolerated and used me for the purpose of harnessing my intelligence and imagination. For years this had made me feel useful and relevant until I realized I no longer belonged amongst men, that despite my contributions there was no benefit to me, only risk, and I began to retreat.

Now, I wish I had someone to explain to me why I am seeing, dreaming, of such things.

I have put paint to canvas, my hands to clay, and yet all attempts to purge the images from my mind has only intensified their terrible hold on me; the tall cities of great limestone boulders of angles I know could not exist, and hieroglyphs that failed to provoke any meaning from my tireless research.

There is a sense of madness in the writings.

Thus, there is now a sense on madness within me.

Although these dreams are only new to my conscious, they feel older than time. I fear they had existed within me for longer than I care to believe.

Accompanying these images are what I shall describe as sounds that vibrate out from the recesses of my brain; nonsensical and beyond human phonetics. There are several tones that reoccur and the closest approximation I can make in English would be _"Cthulhu" and "R'lyeh"_.

I can hear them even in the waking hours and would believe them to be mere delusions brought from fear if not for the reactions of my companions.

When I hear these sensations my canines all whimper and back away from me.

It is becoming a more frequent occurrence and I am becoming scared, for I do not know what lies in the future as these vision increase in their vivid detail. There are shapes amongst the city's heights that lumber through the mist, those of tentacles and horns, spines and wings.

I am unsure why, but I know on the day where I can seem them clearly something terrible will happen.

However, perhaps my true fear is of them seeing me.

* * *

Will woke in a state of panic and sweat, bile lodged half in his throat and heart racing beyond the realms of what he would deem healthy. He clasped at his chest and rolled over in the damp sheets, gasping for breath and a handle on what little sanity he had left.

The dreams had cultivated in a horrifying climax, night after night of terror and sweats until he couldn't differentiate from waking and sleep.

He grasped at the wet sheets for a moment but startled at the sensation between his fingers.

They were not the sheets of his bed as the surface ran thought his fingers. When he looked down he could see the ground shifting underneath him, like slime and sand, threatening to swallow his form whole.

Will cried out and scrambled from the damp to where the earth transformed to hard slabs of rock.

He looked out across the plains and made a choked noise as he tried to get his throat to work. Before him rose the horrid citadel from his nightmares, yet it wasn't a dream. There was a tangible repulsion that there had not been previously.

It was the smell, Will decided. _That_ was what made it real.

There was a deep creaking and whisper that tried to speak to him in the same incomprehensible shadow noise that had become so familiar. It seemed to come from everywhere, but created a strange sense of strengthened awareness a ways off.

Will dragged himself to his feet, blinking at his clear vision despite his lack of glasses.

The stone structures and endless hieroglyphs didn't seem to pass by him as he moved, but somehow he knew he was progressing across the ground.

He seemed to cover more distance than was visible, and he could see out of the corner of his eyes the great beasts that seem to have aged with the strange place yet didn't seem to belong. While he walked, the creatures seemed to move closer but failed to become clear.

The only indication that told Will that his movements were carrying him across the landscape was a crumbling archway and large mass behind it, which remained the only parts of the surrounds that seemed to move to meet him.

Will knew he didn't want to approach, but there was a strange compelling to go there.

The first things he became aware of were a pair of great wings. The shape seemed too large to ever achieve flight, but the closer Will came to the being the more he noticed their span and deathly strength they had to possess.

When the long, horrifically whipping tentacles made him want to turn back, and in a moment he tried to prevent his legs from moving forward which caused his to feel like he was breaking his tibia but had no effect on his stride.

The closer he got to the limbed beast the slower his heart seemed to beat. He got so close he thought he would be swallowed by the limbs before him before his body stopped its mission of movement.

Whatever the great creature was, it loomed over him so high that he could not see the face of the being. He tipped his neck up to see, but the sunless sky somehow reflected back at him everything grotesque in the waking world and he could not bear to look at it.

He wondered, briefly, if he was in Hell.

Will looked down at the ground, waiting for the beast to strike.

"Hello, Will."

The artist spun around.

Before him stood a man who was only slightly taller than he. Above him head were two dark branches, that didn't so much seem to exist as shadow but as a deep absence of all light or shadow but the rest of him seemed human.

He appeared to wear a high-class black suit with a tie that was green to match the tendrils of slime around the landscape.

Will's breath caught. Whomever, or whatever the man was in front of him was oddly beautiful.

"I'm glad you could join us here." He stepped forward, but in a way that didn't seem to disturb the stillness of body. "This is Cthulhu," he reached up and a great sweeping tentacle came down to brush against his hand, "he is the shaper of dreams. He led you here."

"_Why_?"

"Because I wanted to meet you, Will."

"Do you control it?" He made an effort not to look at the being he was referring to.

The man, if that's what he was, chuckled without sound. "Cthulhu cannot be controlled. We merely have an Understanding."

"And w-who are you?"

He opened his mouth and an unpronounceable name rolled off his tongue like lyric, "but perhaps not as you speak," He corrected, "In your English I am Hannibal Lector."

"Okay... Hi."

A weird expression tugged at the corners of Hannibal's mouth. "Yes. Hello, Will."

He nodded. "And why did you want to meet me?"

Hannibal took another step forward and Will would have stepped back if the Cthulhu thing wasn't behind him, a face that he was not happy about.

"You have a unique mind. A beautiful mind." He made a gesture around their surrounds, "This is R'lyeh. We are imprisoned here until the stars permit us. We are ever living, and ever waiting.

"All of us are telepathic, able to taste the minds of all the humans above, which, to be frank, is not many in the grand scheme of things. Yet, we are cut off from them and can only hear the beautiful dreams and communicate when the city starts to lift towards the stars, as it is now.

"Your mind, Will, we can always taste. Always feel. Your mind calls to us as so we are drawn to you inexplicably and inevitably."

Will, for lack of a better response, nodded. "So you brought me here?"

"Yes. We needed to speak to you."

Cupping his hands over his face, Will rubbed at his eyes. This felt too real to not be happening, but he wanted desperately to deny it. He wanted to cry and stick his fingers in his ears like a little kid to try to ignore everything Hannibal was saying.

"And what if I don't want to speak to you? What if I don't to live in fear of these horrible visions and voices and what if I don't what to be here in this place?"

Hannibal tiled his head. "We would greatly appreciate it if you hear out our proposition before you leave."

"Will you let me leave if I don't?"

"No."

"Oh."

He took a sharp breath, although he knew somehow that this world had no air, and slowly released it before nodding. "Fine then."

"My thanks. We," he made a sweeping gesture to the silhouette beings in the distance, "need you to apply for the FBI."

Will felt the colour drain from his face. He had been a Homicide detective years before, but left when it became obvious how everyone was being promoted but him; he was the crazy one, but his deductions made everyone else look good.

It should have frustrated him much more than it had, but instead it created a sense of fear. He knew it had only been a matter of time before the higher-ups noticed him and how he was.

He'd left before that could happen.

He didn't want to put himself there again.

"I don't think that's possible. I wouldn't pass the psych test."

"Inconsequential," Hannibal dismissed. "We need to rise again, and we need you to ensure that our human agents are left undiscovered and their rituals undisturbed... We need you Will, and you will be rewarded with a place at my side in glory."

Will looked at the hand that was presented to him.

He would have been happily to believe that Hannibal was telling the truth. It would be great to feel needed again, but with more equality than he'd previously experienced.

This creature called Hannibal, and the presence of Cthulhu, seemed to be offering him power and responsibility. A _meaning_ to his life that it presently lacked.

But he was a mere human, and these were such fantastical beings that he couldn't imagine why they would offer him anything so desirable in returns for a favour.

"What if I refuse?"

"Then you will never have a moment of sanity again." Hannibal said bluntly but without malice, "Now that you have set foot on R'lyeh there is no barrier between us. We can be in your mind as often and as much as we desire."

"O-Oh."

"But you can trust us, Will. Trust me. I have seen too much of your mind to ever consider destroying it. It is _worthy_ of a throne next to mine."

Hannibal made a motion as if he were about to touch Will's face, but then reached down and grabbed his hand. It felt odd in the human's grasp, as if the form was not really there, but simply a concept trying to contain something greater than it was designed for.

Will realized that Hannibal's human-esque shape was probably only for his benefit.

"What are you?"

"I am Hannibal." He brought a hand up to brush his fingertips against Will's temple, a look on his face akin to proud awe. "What is your decision, Will?"

"I guess... I'll have to do it."

He brushed a curl from Will's forehead.

"Thank you."

* * *

I work in my bed to a terrible sick feeling. My sheets were soaked through and my canine companions were all cluttered around my bed.

Although I remembered nothing, I somehow knew that several days had passed while I lay in bed, clearly in a feverish state. It frightened me that I had no recollection and that I had been alone during my sickness where I could have died.

There was a whisper of something in the back of my mind, words I could never hope to pronounce, but I have no idea where they came from.

I remained sitting in the bed for a while. I do not know why exactly, but the lost time shook me deeper than I would have imagined.

_Perhaps_, the thought reverberated through me, _I should venture from my farm again._

I can make something of my life again, where if I became sick and died there would be people to care. It would mean something to the world if I were not in it.

Months ago an FBI application was delivered under my door, although I do not know who left it there as no one knows where I life.

Perhaps I'll take a teaching position. Something that won't get into my head to much.

Today my imagination seems to have conjured the image of a man in a well tailored suit with great antlers of black.

Today, I shall paint. Tomorrow I will fill out the forms.


End file.
